On the Trinity 31
Summary: The one God is the Father, without origin; the Son, the Word born from him before all time, is God and a second person, yet, having his origin from the Father and returning all things to him in obedience, he does not make two Gods.
Latin text · PL 3:977c–982a
Est ergo Deus Pater omnium institutor et creator, solus originem nesciens, invisibilis, immensus, immortalis, aeternus, unus Deus; cujus neque magnitudini, neque majestati, neque virtuti quidquam non dixerim praeferri, sed nec comparari potest. Ex quo, quando ipse voluit, Sermo Filius natus est: qui non in sono percussi aeris, aut tono coactae de visceribus vocis accipitur; sed in substantia prolatae a Deo virtutis agnoscitur: cujus sacrae et divinae nativitatis arcana nec Apostolus didicit, nec Prophetes comperit, nec Angelus scivit, nec creatura cognovit; Filio soli nota sunt, qui Patris secreta cognovit. Hic ergo, cum sit genitus a Patre, semper est in Patre. Semper autem sic dico, ut non innatum, sed natum probem. Sed qui ante omne tempus est, semper in Patre fuisse dicendus est: nec enim tempus illi assignari potest, qui ante tempus est. Semper enim in Patre: ne Pater non semper sit Pater: quin et Pater illum etiam (quadam ratione) praecedit, quod necesse est (quodammodo) prior sit qua Pater sit. Quoniam (aliquo pacto) antecedat necesse est eum qui habet originem, ille qui originem nescit. Simul ut hic minor sit, dum in illo esse scit, habens originem, quia nascitur; et per Patrem quodammodo (quamvis originem habet qua nascitur) vicinus in nativitate, dum ex eo Patre qui originem solus non habet, nascitur. Hic ergo quando Pater voluit, processit ex Patre: et qui in Patre fuit, processit ex Patre: et qui in Patre fuit, quia ex Patre fuit, cum Patre postmodum fuit, quia ex Patre processit: substantia scilicet illa divina, cujus nomen est Verbum, per quod facta sunt omnia, et sine quo factum est nihil. Omnia enim post ipsum sunt, quia per ipsum sunt. Et merito ipse est ante omnia, sed post Patrem, quando per illum facta sunt omnia; qui processit ex eo, ex cujus voluntate facta sunt omnia. Deus utique procedens ex Deo, secundam personam efficiens post Patrem qua Filius; sed non eripiens illud Patri, quod unus est Deus. Si enim natus non fuisset, innatus comparatus cum eo qui esset innatus, aequatione in utroque ostensa, duos faceret innatos, et ideo duos faceret Deos. Si non genitus esset, collatus cum eo qui genitus non esset, et aequales inventi, duos Deos merito reddidissent non geniti; atque ideo duos Christus reddidisset Deos. Si sine origine esset ut Pater, inventus, et ipse principium omnium ut Pater, duo faciens principia, duos ostendisset nobis consequenter et Deos. Aut si et ipse Filius non esset, sed Pater generans de se alterum Filium, merito collatus cum Patre et tantus denotatus, duos Patres effecisset: et ideo duos approbasset etiam Deos. Si invisibilis fuisset, cum invisibili collatus, par expressus, duos invisibiles ostendisset; et ideo duos comprobasset et Deos. Si incomprehensibilis, si et caetera quaecunque sunt Patris, merito, dicimus, duorum Deorum quam isti confingunt, controversiam suscitasset. Nunc autem quidquid est, non ex se est, quia nec innatus est; sed ex Patre est, quia genitus est: sive dum Verbum est, sive dum Virtus est, sive dum Sapientia est, sive dum Lux est, sive dum Filius est, et quidquid horum est, dum non aliunde est, quam, sicut diximus jam superius, ex Patre; Patri suo originem suam debens, discordiam divinitatis de numero duorum Deorum facere non potuit, qui ex illo qui est unus Deus, originem nascendo contraxit. Quo genere dum et unigenitus est, et primogenitus ex illo est qui originem non habet, unus est omnium rerum et principium et caput. Idcirco unum Deum asseruit, quem non sub ullo principio aut initio, sed initium potius et principium rerum omnium comprobavit. Filius autem nihil ex arbitrio suo gerit, nec ex consilio suo facit, nec a se venit, sed imperiis paternis omnibus et praeceptis obedit: ut quamvis probet illum nativitas Filium, tamen morigera obedientia asserat illum paternae voluntatis, ex quo est, ministrum: ita dum se Patri in omnibus obtemperantem reddit, quamvis sit et Deus, unum tamen Deum Patrem de obedientia sua ostendit, ex quo et originem traxit. Et ideo duos Deos facere non potuit, quia nec duas origines fecit, qui ex eo qui originem non habet, principium nativitatis ante omne tempus accepit. Nam cum id sit principium caeteris quod innatum est (quod Deus solus Pater est qui extra originem est; ex quo hic est qui natus est), dum qui ex illo nascitur, merito ex eo venit qui originem non habet, principium probans illud esse ex quo ipse est; etiamsi Deus est qui natus est, unum tamen Deum ostendit, quem hic qui natus est, esse sine origine comprobavit. Est ergo Deus, sed in hoc ipsum genitus, ut esset Deus. Est et Dominus, sed in hoc ipsum natus ex Patre, ut esset Dominus. Est et Angelus, sed ad annuntiandum magnum Dei consilium, ex Patre suo Angelus destinatus. Cujus sic divinitas traditur, ut non aut dissonantia aut inaequalitate divinitatis duos Deos reddidisse videatur. Subjectis enim ei quasi Filio omnibus rebus a Patre, dum ipse cum his quae illi subjecta sunt, Patri suo subjicitur, Patris quidem sui Filius probatur; caeterorum autem et Dominus et Deus esse reperitur. Ex quo dum huic qui est Deus omnia substrata traduntur, et cuncta sibi subjecta Filius accepta refert Patri, totam divinitatis auctoritatem rursus Patri remittit; unus Deus ostenditur verus et aeternus Pater: a quo solo haec vis divinitatis emissa, etiam in Filium tradita et directa, rursum per substantiae communionem ad Patrem revolvitur. Deus quidem ostenditur Filius, cui divinitas tradita et porrecta conspicitur; et tamen nihilominus unus Deus Pater probatur, dum gradatim reciproco meatu illa majestas atque divinitas ad Patrem qui dederat eam, rursum ab illo ipso Filio missa revertitur et retorquetur; ut merito Deus Pater omnium Deus sit, et principium ipsius quoque Filii sui, quem Dominum genuit: Filius autem caeterorum omnium Deus sit, quoniam omnibus illum Deus Pater praeposuit quem genuit: ita Mediator Dei et hominum Christus Jesus omnis creaturae subjectam sibi habens a Patre proprio potestatem qua Deus est; cum tota creatura subdita sibi, concors Patri suo Deo inventus, unum et solum et verum Deum Patrem suum, manente in illo quod etiam auditus est, breviter approbavit.
English · Claude translation
God the Father, then, the Founder and Creator of all things, who alone knows no origin, invisible, immeasurable, immortal, eternal, is one God; to whose greatness, majesty, and power nothing can, I will not say be preferred, but even be compared. From him, when he himself willed, the Word, the Son, was born: who is not understood as the sound of struck air or the tone of a voice forced from the lungs, but is recognized in the substance of a power brought forth from God. The secrets of his sacred and divine birth neither an apostle has learned, nor a prophet discovered, nor an angel known, nor a creature recognized; they are known to the Son alone, who has known the Father's secrets. This one, then, since he is begotten of the Father, is always in the Father. But I say “always” in such a way as to prove him not unborn but born. Yet he who is before all time must be said to have been always in the Father; for no time can be assigned to him who is before time. For he is always in the Father, lest the Father should not always be Father. Yet the Father also in a certain sense precedes him, since it is necessary that he should in some way be prior, inasmuch as he is Father. For he who knows no origin must in some manner go before him who has an origin. At the same time the Son is less, since he knows that he is in the Father, having an origin because he is born; and he is in some way near to the Father in his birth (though he has an origin inasmuch as he is born), since he is born of that Father who alone has no origin.
This one, then, when the Father willed, proceeded from the Father; and he who was in the Father proceeded from the Father; and he who was in the Father, because he was from the Father, was afterwards with the Father, because he proceeded from the Father: that divine substance, namely, whose name is the Word, through whom all things were made, and without whom nothing was made. For all things are after him, because they are through him. And rightly he is before all things, but after the Father, since all things were made through him; he proceeded from him by whose will all things were made. God, certainly, proceeding from God, constituting a second person after the Father, as Son; but not taking from the Father this, that he is one God. For if he had not been born, then, as unborn, compared with him who was unborn, equality being shown in both, he would make two unborn, and therefore would make two Gods. If he had not been begotten, then, compared with him who was not begotten and found equal, the two not begotten would rightly have produced two Gods; and so Christ would have produced two Gods. If he had been found without origin like the Father, and himself the beginning of all things like the Father, he would have made two beginnings and consequently would have shown us two Gods as well. Or if he too were not the Son, but a Father begetting another Son from himself, rightly, compared with the Father and marked as equally great, he would have made two Fathers, and therefore would have proved two Gods as well. If he had been invisible, compared with the Invisible and declared equal, he would have shown two invisibles, and therefore would have proved two Gods as well. If incomprehensible, if whatever else belongs to the Father, then, we say, he would rightly have raised the controversy about two Gods which these men invent. But as it is, whatever he is, he is not from himself, because he is not unborn; but he is from the Father, because he is begotten: whether as he is the Word, or as he is the Power, or as he is the Wisdom, or as he is the Light, or as he is the Son, and whatever of these he is, since he is from no other source than, as we said above, from the Father, owing his origin to his Father, he could not make a discord of divinity by the number of two Gods, since he took his origin by being born from him who is the one God. In this way, since he is both only-begotten and firstborn from him who has no origin, there is one beginning and head of all things. Therefore he asserted one God, whom he proved to be under no beginning or starting point, but rather the start and beginning of all things.
But the Son does nothing of his own will, nor acts by his own counsel, nor comes of himself, but obeys all his Father's commands and precepts: so that, although his birth proves him the Son, yet his compliant obedience declares him the minister of the Father's will, from whom he is; and so, while he renders himself obedient to the Father in all things, though he too is God, yet by his obedience he shows the one God the Father, from whom he also drew his origin. And therefore he could not make two Gods, because neither did he make two origins, since he received the beginning of his birth before all time from him who has no origin. For since that which is unborn is the beginning for the rest (that is, God the Father alone, who is outside origin, from whom he who is born exists), since he who is born of him rightly comes from him who has no origin, proving that to be the beginning from which he himself is: even though he who is born is God, he nonetheless shows one God, whom he who is born proved to be without origin. He is, then, God, but begotten for this very purpose, that he might be God. He is also Lord, but born of the Father for this very purpose, that he might be Lord. He is also Angel, but destined by his Father as Angel to announce the great counsel of God. His divinity is so handed down that he does not seem, either by dissonance or by inequality of divinity, to have produced two Gods. For since all things have been made subject to him as Son by the Father, while he himself, with the things subject to him, is made subject to his Father, he is proved to be the Son of his Father, but is found to be both Lord and God of all the rest. Hence, since all things put beneath him are handed over to him who is God, and the Son refers back to the Father all things made subject to him as received, he gives back again to the Father the whole authority of divinity; the one God is shown to be the true and eternal Father, from whom alone this power of divinity is sent forth, and, handed over and directed also into the Son, returns again to the Father through the communion of substance. The Son, indeed, is shown to be God, to whom divinity is seen to have been handed over and extended; and yet nonetheless the Father is proved to be the one God, since step by step, by a reciprocal course, that majesty and divinity, sent back by the Son himself, returns and is turned back again to the Father who had given it; so that rightly God the Father is the God of all, and the beginning even of his own Son, whom he begot as Lord; while the Son is God of all the rest, since God the Father set over all him whom he begot. So Christ Jesus, the Mediator of God and men, having from his own Father power over every creature made subject to him, inasmuch as he is God, with the whole creation subject to him, found in concord with God his Father, has briefly proved his Father to be the one and only and true God, while there remains in him that for which he was also heard.
About this passage
Notes
Translation notes
- This closing chapter states Novatian's pre-Nicene subordinationism plainly (the Son “less”, the Father “in a certain sense” prior, the Son born “when the Father willed”); it is translated as written, without harmonizing it to later creeds. The allusions are Matt 11:27; John 1:3; Col 1:15; John 5:19, 30 and 6:38; Isa 9:6 (LXX “Angel of great counsel”); 1 Cor 15:27–28; 1 Tim 2:5; Heb 5:7 (“he was heard”). The last clause (“manente in illo quod etiam auditus est”) is obscure, apparently alluding to Heb 5:7.
Notes on the original text
- Digital text corrected (OCR: e for a; OCR: e for i; OCR: i for o; OCR: i for t; OCR: l for t; split word; OCR: n for u; OCR: o for u; OCR: period for comma; OCR: split word; OCR: stray letter; OCR: u for o; OCR: uncertain character; OCR: words run together): solos originem → solus originem; voluit. Sermo → voluit, Sermo; nola sunt qui Pa tris → nota sunt, qui Patris; dic(??) → dico; qnod → quod; duos Deus merito → duos Deos merito; collatus. par → collatus, par; Nuncautem → Nunc autem; nativi tas → nativitas; minis trum → ministrum; Pa trem de obedientia → Patrem de obedientia; ex qui et originem → ex quo et originem; ex eo venet → ex eo venit; probens → probans; Esi et Dominus → Est et Dominus; consililum → consilium.
Cite this passage
Novatian, Trin. 31 (PL 3:977c–982a; trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/novatian-trinitate/31/).
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Plain text
Novatian, Trin. 31 (PL 3:977c–982a; trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/novatian-trinitate/31/).
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